J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit (Maple Films Edit)

This is one of two fan edits I watched of The Hobbit trilogy (the other being The Bilbo Edition). I watched the two fan edits after making my own, private, fan edit for my friends and family to see, and wanted to see if any other people had the same ideas as I did.

Like most Tolkien fans, I found the trilogy disappointing. It had so much potential, but in the end, it was not the movie that I waited years and years to see. Such disappointment was what prompted me to seek out fan edits of the movies.

Now, personally, I can't decide whether I prefer this version or The Bilbo Edition. I think both are spectacular fan edits from people who both had similar ideas on how to improve the movies. Comparing the two, I think that this version probably has the better music and transistion editing, but I still can't decide which is better.

That said, I think Dustin Lee did a marvelous job editing out all the distracting subplots and action foolishness.

*Improvements*

- The first thing you'll notice about this edit is the color correction. While I didn't mind the colors from the original movies, I have to say that the color correction really makes the movie look a lot better. If I'm not mistaken, this is the only fan edit that does this.

- The flashback to Erebor is completely gone. This was one of those times with the original movie where I was waiting for the story to start, and just thinking, "Wouldn't it be better to just to introduce Erebor during the Unexpected Party? That way, we would be confused along with Bilbo." My observations turned out to be spot on, as the filmmakers felt the need to spend a good half-hour at Bilbo's house, telling us everything we already knew. Now that the flashback is cut out, the story flows a lot better.

- Gandalf is onscreen in three minutes. No more of this "Oh look! It's Frodo! Hi Frodo! I wasn't expecting to see you here!" the filmmakers don't need to add extra characters to familierizes viewers with LOTR, as they already have Gandalf and Elrond.

- Dol Guldur subplot is completely gone. It's still clear that Sauron is behind some of the events that happen in the story, but it's put more in the background, in favor of telling Bilbo's story. You know, "The Hobbit?" Not "The Wizard." Not "The Dwarves." "The Hobbit."

- Likewise, Tauriel and Legolas are now minor characters. I'm fine with Legolas being in the movie (as he likely would have been at Mirkwood at the time), and I'm not opposed to showing a few female characters, but the way these characters were used in the original movies just distracted from the story, and ended up going nowhere. Now, Legolas and Tauriel just appear briefly in Mirkwood, briefly at the Battle of Five Armies, and there's no crazy Legolas stunts, no Orc invasion in Lake Town, and absolutely no love triangle.

- Azog isn't introduced until the Goblin King mentions him. This way, we don't get introduced to the threat that the Orcs pose until a much later point than the movies originally did. I felt with the original movies that the filmmakers were upping the stakes much too early in the films. I'm fine with the expanded role of the Orcs, but they just came into the movies too early... Movies need to start out slow, and then build up, and Dustin Lee did a good job at making it flow that way.

- Dustin Lee does some digital alteration to make all thirteen dwarves appear at the Lonely Mountain during the long-shots, and also changes the Orc subtitles at one point to fix what would otherwise have been continuity errors.

Now for the things that I didn't like.

*Things That Can't Be Fixed*

- Despite the filmmakers' efforts to make Gandalf a more likable character, they inexplicably cut out Bilbo inviting Gandalf to tea, making it look like Gandalf invited himself, and broke into Bilbo's house. This is one of the things that bothered me about the movie, and unfortunately, no amount of fan editing is going to fix it.

- Likewise, some of the dwarves don't really look like dwarves, and Thorin is too young.

- Azog. I'm one of the people who wanted to see Bolg instead of Azog. It would have been more interesting to see a subplot about an Orc that wants revenge on Thorin for killing his father during the Battle of Moria, than the subplot we actually got about an Orc that just happens to hate Thorin and his family for no apparent reason. Once again, no amount of editing is going to fix this problem.

- Gandalf inexplicably disappears when the dwarves head toward the Misty Mountains. In the original movies, there was an explanation for this, but since the Dol Guldur subplot was cut, they just leave without him for no apparent reason. I guess one could assume from Balin's words that they were going to "wait in the mountains until Gandalf joined us. That was the plan," that Gandalf had business to attend to, and sent the dwarves on ahead (similar to at Mirkwood later). But it just feels a bit odd.

- So many things I wanted to see for action. When I was a kid, I imagined all the torches in the goblin caves slowly going out, the room getting darker and darker, and then the fire exploding, killing a bunch of goblins. Then, Glamdring coming out of the shadows, visible only by its glow, and killing the Goblin King. Then, the sword is raised, and we see Gandalf's face made visible by the glow of the sword. That would have been so cool. Did we get that in the movie? No. Is it possible to put it in the movie? No.

- Bilbo finding Smaug's weak spot is still a pretty bad. In the book, Bilbo simply asks to see Smaug's chest, secretly planning to see if there's a weak spot, despite the fact that there's no reason for him to believe so. Oh wow? Look! He DID have a weak spot! How coincidental is that? The filmmakers must have realized this, and decided to put in a legend that Smaug had a weak spot. I was expecting Bilbo to actually ask to see Smaug's chest specifically to see if the legend was true, as that would have made so much sense. More sense than the book, in fact. And then he would tell the thrush to tell Bard about the weak spot. But, nope. Instead, Bilbo sees the weak spot by chance, as does Bard. A wasted opportunity, in my opinion. It can't be fixed. Just consider it an adaptational change that did absolutely nothing for the story.

-Last, but not least, Gandalf claims that elvish swords glow when Orcs are near, but the filmmakers mess up by having only Sting glow.

Now for stuff that the editor could have done.

*Editing Oddities*

- Despite the inclusion of Azog, there's no backstory about it at all. We're just left to assume that they're enemies for no reason whatsoever. Granted, I don't want the flashback to the Battle of Moria to be as early as it was in the movies, but maybe it could have been moved to before the dwarves meet Beorn or something.

- Just a matter of taste here, but I would have rather saved everything about the Ring being connected to Sauron for the LOTR movies. The ring should not be affecting Bilbo this much this early on, and it's kind of distracting from the story. It also makes Gandalf and Bilbo's speech at the end habe a completely different meaning than it originally did in the book. In the book, Gandalf was saying that Bilbo didn't accomplish his quest because of luck, but because it was his destiny. In the movie, he's saying that Bilbo didn't accomplish his quest because of luck, but because he had a magic ring. It would have been nice to see the footage re-looped to match the conversation from the book.

- I don't know why Dustin Lee kept the dwarves encountering Smaug. It adds nothing to the story but to pad it out. I'm pretty sure that had the filmmakers done just two films like they originally planned, Smaug would simply have left his cave as soon as he was done talking to Bilbo.

- Thorin inexplicably has Orcrist back for the final battle. I wouldn't have minded a shortened Legolas vs. Bolg fight just to solve this plot hole (I don't mind him riding a bat, and the fight could have ended with the bridge collapsing over Bolg, leaving the audience to assume he was crushed to death, and this would have cut out those crazy broken stair-climbing stunts).

- Despite Dustin's attempt to digitally alter the shot, it's still clear that Smaug is covered with some sort of liquid when he leaves the mountain.

- And last but not least, I have to side with the guy who edited The Bilbo Editon, and say that there's very little likelihood that Smaug would know the name "Okenshield," as Thorin got that name AFTER Smaug took over the kingdom. It's not impossible that Smaug had messengers of some sort, but I consider it quite a stretch that he would have found out anything about the dwarves he stole the kingdom from.

*Final Thoughts*

It's considered one of the best fan edits of the Hobbit trilogy, and, despite the fact that I've only seen one other, I have to agree. It's very well done, and has much better pacing and storytelling than the original movies did. Do I recommend this edit? Yes! Watch it with your family, and enjoy it!

A clean cut, no-nonsense edit that stays focused on Bilbo's adventure. So many good edits, largely consistent with what others have done but also some new changes. I loved the extensive Rivendell material left in - it's an important part of the journey for Bilbo, the imagery is fantastic, and there are excellent scenes with Elrond. I don't mind staying there a while! The Goblin Town and Gollum scenes were also spot on, I was really rolling with the edit here. The focus on the wargs during the frying pan sequence was good, but that white orc is just awful. The goal should be to make him non-existent as possible until the final battle.

I would have enjoyed hanging with Beorn a little longer. It definitely felt choppy and odd, like a cliff notes of what the full scenes are. Some really good editing between the Wood Elves and Lake Town, again mostly consistent with what other editors have done. But small things I have not seen, like cutting Bard bringing them the crappy weapons first - instead he says he has it worked out and then they are sneaking into the armory (easily assumed Bard told them where it is and how they might get in). Unfortunately too much Alfrid JarJar Binks.

Then it happened, after they reached Erebor and found the door things went awry. Why the dwarf vs dragon scenes??? I couldn't believe that much of the silly chase was left in, which serves only to make Smaug look much less the greatest of calamities, more like the greatest of comedies. Also there were odd clips like the forges starting for no apparent reason. Then the finale was the dragon coming out of Erebor mysteriously completely covered in gold. I have to say the dragon part of the edit is by far the weakest, and highly recommend it be reworked.

In summary, a really nice effort at a 3 in 1 of the Hobbit. It works in so many ways but still comes up short of the ideal edit of this franchise in my opinion. I would recommend it because of how well the second half of the movie works and flows to the end. It is also a great example of how all the external storylines can be removed and not really missed.

Most of the critique offered of these films comes from Tolkien fans and unsurprisingly most of the criticism is about adaption. For me this hides a more fundamental truth about the films failures. Whatever ones enthusiasm for the source :

1) They are extremely poorly structured, the set ups are over long and tedious, the pacing is off and the resolution to many of the set ups either telegraphed or simply wither.
2) They lack any kind of tonal personality or coherence. Indeed they do not know what they are or whom they are for. They attempt to be an homage, all-round family entertainment, profound and geo political and replace the charm of the book with occasional bouts of the most excruciatingly unfunny humour and in the last film the gags become vicious and brutal.
3) The most lamentable element is the poor values of the story telling endless fighting which achieves no change, characters undergo experiences and do not change and relationships are inconsistent. You can remove entire sections and no story telling is lost that is why the experience of watching them induces fatigue. Even more insidious are sub plots which threaten to overwhelm and indeed detract from the main story.

Some how the maker of this edit has managed to reduce or expunge many of these problems but he has had to be brutal. The sub plot of Dol Gulder which could have given these films there gravitas is axed and separated out into a small feature, entirely necessary, but the re imagining of the Hobbit in the style of the Rings needed that sub plot and was rich with potential. Indeed because it was sketched into the appendices of the Rings it needed first class writers to flesh it out and these films convince me that Fran and Phillippa, however dedicated, just do not have the talent to create something special by extension.

Other changes are less brutal but the editor of this film knows his subject and so we see Martins Bilbo emerge in to the central performance and shines more brightly for it. Curiously his editing style, which gives the story pace and focus, then enables you to enjoy the physical establishment of middle earth that much more and all the hard work of the fantastic crew in Wellington who created the textures of the film.

As others have said elements are clunky particularly the Dwarf deaths but if you want to sit down with the Hobbit as a winter film without your teeth grinding this is the ones to watch.

Audio/Video Quality: 8
The 1920x800 MP4 looks surprisingly good given the small filesize and over 4-hour length. The re-grading for the most part looks quite good, not perfect but very much an improvement. However, the de-saturation is taken a little too far overall for my tastes and in a few rare spots verges on monochrome. There is at least one spot where the grade has gone wrong. During the spider sequence a scene goes very grey, then green, then very grey again. I assume the grey was the intended look and a few shots just got forgotten about?

Visual Editing: 7
The technical visual editing was seamless for the majority of the edits (which are numerous) but there are a few spots that let the edit down. The best part is the barrel-ride. I've seen a lot of Hobbit edits and even played around with editing that scene myself and this is by far the best I've seen it handled. Another strong moment was the inspired inter-cutting of Fili and Kili's deaths, although it was right somehow in a few shots. While I'm generally of the opinion that I like these films long, the big removals of many added sub-plots was a really welcome change of pace.

The worst part is probably the removal of the were-worms. After all the other smooth edits in the preceding 3.5-hours, relatively speaking, this felt like a car crash. I'm sure it could have been handled better. The editing of the frying-pan scene was technically well handled but felt all wrong and a bit laughable when the terrifying and might "Pale Orc" is defeated by pine cones. It worked in the book (Without Azog), but this is not the book. Legolas' arrival felt quite abrupt, due to what I suspect was an over keenness to trim his non-canonical scenes down. As others have noted, the gold scene is removed but the gold covered Dragon is not. Some attempt should a have been made to fix this. A fanedit shouldn't rely on the audience to think "Ohhhh it's okay, it's only a fanedit. I'll pretend I didn't see that".

I was slightly disappointed with the "intermission" because if I wanted one unbroken 4-hour movie, it didn't give me that and if I wanted to experience the originally intended two-film structure, it didn't do that either. So close though. Hopefully someone will pull the latter off one day.

Audio Editing: 9
This was mostly seamless and impressive with only a few rare awkward music changes across the whole 4-hours.

Narrative: 6
First off, I was left unsure what the editing strategy was with this fanedit. At first you think, well this a "book cut" because it still includes truly dreadful (but canonical) early scenes like the plates song but then it later removes great material from the book like most of Beorn's scenes. Another example is with the controversial Alfrid character. He's trimmed down heavily but then reappears for no good reason (He was easily removable) right after we the audience could reasonably have assumed he was dead... then he is never seen again?

I personally think it's of paramount importance with a fanedit, that it works like a real movie, in it's own right. Sadly this edit doesn't do that in a lot of places. Characters just walk in to shot with no introduction and start saying things like everyone knows who they are. Events happen without explanation. Characters disappear for no reason. Vital exposition is missing. Legolas turns up at the battle but takes no part in it. Mighty Eleven blades that certain characters do not possess anymore... magically appear in their hands again at the end of the movie. The ultimate compliment to pay a "Fanfix" is "This REPLACES the original movie for me" but you cannot say this here, as you NEED to see the original to understand what is going on far too often.

It's a shame because the general pattern of removals is very good. With just a little more care taken over a few lines and character points, these problems could have been avoided. Or more probably, just a little less should have been removed, so coherence was maintained. Maybe the goal of hitting the 4-hour mark, meant things were removed that should have been left in for a still trim, but smooth 4.5/5-hour version?

Also just because a slim and whimsical children's book has a major character completely disappear for most of the running time, doesn't mean a movie can get away with it. You'd never release this version into cinemas and expect audiences to be okay with Gandalf's absence never being explained. Plus one of the two best things about the Hobbit is Sir Ian's Gandalf, so removing at least half of his scenes is not an improvement, to narrative, or enjoyment.

Enjoyment: 7
I didn't love the first half as I've seen it handled much better in other edits but the handling of the second-half felt very different and unique. It didn't always work 100% but it was well worth the watch to see the material slashed so heavily and still sorta work. Lastly, if you are wanting a very Bilbo-centric edit, then this achieves that very well.